The case for the defence

16 April 2013 08:05

After spending 24 hours being criticised for voting against league reconstruction, Saints have released a lengthy statement justifying their position.

Like last week's release which stated how chairman Stewart Gilmour planned to vote, it's difficult to find too much to disagree with. The full thing - which I won't reproduce here - can be read at http://www.saintmirren.net/pages/?p=22582

In the statement Mr Gilmour explains that the offer of a change to a 9-3 vote wasn't good enough because it was only for league structure, rather than everything. He also confirms that Aberdeen - who have been highly critical of our stance - had stopped an earlier attempt to ditch the 11-1 voting set-up. Had that happened, they'd have got their way.

Another proposal was made to clubs yesterday from ourselves and Ross County, suggesting the good bits of the package be adopted but the controversial bits - like 12-12-18 - were taken out. This found favour with some clubs, but evidently not enough.

The only bit of the statement I disagree with slightly is the response to claims we were voting on behalf of Rangers. This is denied, but the wording does leave paranoid conspiracy hunters the chance to claim that Mr Gilmour could think the best interests of St Mirren and Scottish football are for the Ibrox club to be jumped up the league. Mind you, elsewhere he has threatened legal action against people accusing him of a hidden Rangers agenda so we don't need to worry too much!

All in all, another good statement that sets out our position perfectly. I agree with pretty much everything that was said, but with the SFL clubs meeting on Monday over a possible SPL2 (which our board don't back) I doubt we've heard the last of this.